Are You Getting Serviced Properly?

I recently attended a meeting at a large multi-national on an unrelated matter but was asked to look at their generator. The generator had been serviced the previous month, but what I found was astonishing.

The 500kVA generator is serviced by one of the largest service providers in the country. However, other than the new oil and fuel filters it looked as if it had not been touched for years. Most of the hoses showed signs of leaks and hose deterioration, and one of the jacket heaters was not working. In addition there was a significant oil leak from one side of the engine, and the radiator core was leaking. The generator was filthy dirty and under the generator there was an oily mess which had not been cleaned up for what looked like years. Even though there was a full spill kit with clean pig mats available in the room, the service engineer obviously could not be bothered to leave the area clean. The firewire was dangling loose so the firevalve was obviously locked into position making this very important safely device totally inoperative.

What kind of quality control procedures do most service companies have in place to avoid this happening? How many service companies randomly inspect their service engineer’s performance to make sure quality standards are kept up? I am sure most will trot out the argument that the customers only look for ever lower costs. Whilst this is true it is not the whole truth as a generator which does not function in an emergency is an asset not worth maintaining.